The topic of non-supernatural intelligent design appears deserving of its own thread where many more people are able to see it and join in.

This thread is a spin-off from Zero's thread: Creationism does NOT belong in science. By spinning off, this thread can explore further the topic herein unencumbered by the much broader range of possible topics still carrying forth 'over there'. Also, the discussion here won't hijack and divert Zero's thread away from his original topic, and it gives us the ability to more narrowly focus the discussion in a very specific way.

*******-> Therefore, I ask that all posters wishing to discuss the "SUPERNATURAL" form of Intelligent Design" (you know: "god did it, and Zeus watched") to please do so only in the other thread. We thank you.

As you see in the other thread, there is here a rather pronounced, though not unanimous, general disregard for pleas to the supernatural. That is, no doubt, why you have come to SciForums--motivated by a sincere desire to make your case for:

Intelligent Design, like naturalism, is a distinct epistemology. ID and naturalism are frameworks for theories and hypotheses, an epistemological underpinning for those theories and hypotheses.

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....to such a community. In fact, you appreciate that you must be able to make your case effectively here, before you are able to anticipate similarly being able to sway the minds of others in other truly more rigorous venues. Because, as you've stated:

The only way to find out if a theory of intelligent design can advance our understanding beyond that of a "blind watchmaker" theory is to use the scientific method....

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....(with the associated apriori need to resort to a modified form ot the scientific method, as in)....

....from an ID perspective....

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....and see what comes from it.

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....and the price of being able to sway such minds is being truly persuasive.

Arising from our not unexpected disregard, the sufficient, though not formally rigorous, case has been made (in the other thread ) as to the why and how creationism is invalidated as a viable adjunct of science--a premise you already find agreeable; as you've stated:

I agree that ID research has been hijacked as part of a larger cultural and political movement.

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Intelligent design doesn't invoke a deity.

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--and so, such case already having been made, together let us all now stipulate that unprovable supernatural agents and aspects normally attributed to "Intelligent Design" henceforth have no merit in furthering the discussion of non-super-natural intelligent design now at hand.

So, onto the presentation of the specifics of your case, Warren, for natural (as opposed to super-natural) intelligent design (NID)....

To help this part of the discussion to move over here, I have gathered some representative samplings of your thoughts below, mostly to spare people having to go back and forth between the threads so much. I appreciate that this collection of 'samplings' may only reflect my own personal selection bias as to what stands out most in relevence to introducing this iteration of the discussion. To that, I cop to owing a nominal amount of pleadings mea culpa.

....you replied, "Depends on how you define creationism and how you define science."

Elsewhere, you asked of various others:

>"A scientist suspects that non-intelligent processes may be insufficient to produce biological complexity. He wishes to follow-up his suspicion with an investigation using the scientific method. .... Can what he is doing be called science?"

>"....are you opposed to anything that's not compatible with materialism?"

>"If biological structures are not created by random, blind, purposeless copying errors plus natural selection then how are they created? (There is nothing for natural selection to select until a complex, rational, functioning biological structure is in existence.) Is life ‘self organized’? Intelligently self-organized? What would be the difference between intelligently self-organized and intelligently designed?"

>"....without the evidence of direct experience and testimony, could we ever hope to detect such intelligent intervention? In other words, is it possible to *indirectly* detect intelligent intervention? If not, then the claim, "There is no evidence of intelligent intervention," becomes rather meaningless. For it would simply mean that our methods failed to detect the things our methods are unable to detect. But if we can indirectly detect intelligent intervention, then such an effort would qualify as science and the results would be meaningful."

>"As for teleologists presenting something unequivocal I suppose you mean (1) showing the designer in action, or (2) discovering the actual design protocols (i.e., the designer's lab notebook) or (3) providing an example of something that couldn't possibly have evolved. The problem is that even if life was indeed designed (for example), there is not one good reason (not one) why we should be able to do (1), (2), or (3). That is, (1), (2), and (3) are simply not entailed by the truth of ID in history. So the question is how do we go about detecting ID without (1), (2), and (3). And that is what ID is all about. It is about looking for fingerprints of intelligent intervention. It is about employing an "if, then" forensic approach to guide an experimental inquiry that can generate results that either support or weaken the initial design inference."

>"I can think of three possible explanations of evolution: 1) The theistic assumption that God guides nature’s creative processes. 2) A creative intelligence innate in all living matter drives the process -- a creative intelligence which might be viewed as a natural force such as gravity. However, unlike gravity, creative intelligence is neither measurable nor predictable. 3) Novel Biological structures are the result of some unknown non-intelligent, mechanistic process - as yet to be specified by ‘science’. Does our present understanding allow us to impose any one of these possibilities upon society, and prohibit consideration of the others?"

>"If science is required to limit itself to mechanistic explanations, and life is not a mechanistic process, perhaps science can not explain life."

>"....without the evidence of direct experience and testimony, could we ever hope to detect such intelligent intervention? In other words, is it possible to *indirectly* detect intelligent intervention? If not, then the claim, "There is no evidence of intelligent intervention," becomes rather meaningless. For it would simply mean that our methods failed to detect the things our methods are unable to detect."

You said variously in regards to Science, naturalism, or materialism:

>"Scientists don't accept naturalistic abiogenesis because of the evidence. No, scientists accept naturalistic abiogenesis because the game rules of science preclude any hint of teleology."

>"....it's important to note that the hostility of the scientific community towards creationism is .... a commitment of the scientific community to the blind watchmaker hypothesis."

>"....so far no one has specified exactly how biological complexity might actually be created."

>"One can use the scientific method without subscibing to the philosophy of materialism."

>" It is a faulty assumption that science is about coming up with the best possible explanation."

>"That a competent blind watchmaker may not exist at all and that certain aspects of biotic reality may be better explained by a seeing watchmaker...."

>"I believe ID can be detected in a working sense. That is, one can score features that provisionally place something in the tentative "designed" category and build from there. This is why ID researchers prefer making a "design inference" rather than asserting they have detected design."

>"Intelligent design is a form of teleology and not creationism.

>"I personally see more than sufficient evidence to trigger a suspicion that ID is behind the origin of life in the fact that biology not only needs teleological language and concepts, but that such concepts really do generate an understanding of life. I think life expresses enough complex specified information such that ID is a better explanation for its origin than geochemistry. For me, this evidence goes beyond mere suspicion and takes me close to the realm of the "most likely."

About NID as Epistemology you've said:

>"Why am I open to teleological explanations? It's a judgment call,...."

>"I'm not looking for a fail proof detector of ID."

>"I need a much more rigorous set of evidence to think random mutations and natural selection were indeed the only mechanisms behind the origin of biological innovations post-abiogenesis."

>"To me, it is not a question of proof, but a question of whether data exist that trigger a suspicion of ID."

>"The ID movement has the potential of evening the playing field by reviving its arguments in more sophisticated versions."

>"I'm questioning this whole notion that in order for a theory to be useful and increase our understanding of biotic reality it has to be devoid of teleology."

>"....if we can indirectly detect intelligent intervention, then such an effort would qualify as science and the results would be meaningful."

Some other things you have said:

>"Simply trying to establish that something is possible is about as weak of a claim there can be."

Some things said by others that you have quoted to make a your own point:

>"....plausibility is about the weakest criterion one can apply to an evolutionary hypothesis."

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I can consider sentient Intelligent Design quite easily--aliens, for instance, having engineered our earliest ancestors' RNA and/or it precursor. But, I don't think that is what you mean by Intelligent Design.

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Ive been thinking about this lately, mostly because my most recent time waster is rereading "Morning of the magicians".

Matter evolved from nothing (or really a primal singularity).

Life appears to have somehow evolved from matter.

Conciousness has evolved from life.

What next?

I dont know if I would go so far as to posit intellegent design, Im thinking more along the lines of the development of conciosness and spirt (very unscientific word) being inherent in the evolution of universes.
So Im for explanation 2)A creative intelligence innate in all living matter drives the process -- a creative intelligence which might be viewed as a natural force such as gravity. However, unlike gravity, creative intelligence is neither measurable nor predictable.

Maybe it is measurable though, not in calories or grams or ergs but in ethical systems. As the universe develops and becomes more self aware, how do ethical systems change? Maybe they would change to reflect the recognition of the presence this creative intellegence in all living beings. Maybe from "an eye for an eye" to "do unto others" (Please dont hang me for using christian examples here you can find the same sentiment in taoism and buddhism). Every change should be measurable, but where to look for the data?

>>Youre you thinking that maybe because ethical systems are human constructs then humans are the means for the universe to convert its proposed 'creative intelligence' into ethical systems?

No. I think ethical systems evolving toward greater respect for concious awareness as expressed in human beings might be a signal of an evolution of the universe as a whole, of the entire system (not a good word but the only one i can think of now) evolving toward greater awareness.

>>>That humans are Nature's way of manifesting this 'creative intelligence' in a form other things like rocks and trees cannot?

Maybe. But maybe humans just manifest this awareness according to the means that they have. Rock and trees are part of the system too though, first matter, then life, then consiousness. All of the parts of an earlier form would be included in the manifestation of the next. It wouldnt be just ethical systems though if the theory were correct youd have to be able to see an "upward" trend in all kinds of human endeavor, instead of upward make that maybe more inclusive, in the same way that conciousness includes all the earlier forms. I chose ethics off the top of my head because reading the religion forum I am always impressed at the quantum leap between the "eye for an eye" and later developments and the number of ethical throwbacks we carry along with us

What Im thinking is more along the lines of ethical evolution (increasing inclusivity and respect for concious awareness in other beings) being a sign of greater consiousness as a whole expressed through human beings.

As far as brains in general i dont think that the reductionist idea of human consciousness being exactly congruent to the physical structure of the brain and its chemical and electrical processes is going to survive this discussion. While thats a useful frame of reference for doing brain surgury or prescriging psychoactive drugs to cure depression im not sure that this discussion isnt outside that ideas useful frame of application.

What Im thinking is more along the lines of ethical evolution (increasing inclusivity and respect for concious awareness in other beings)....

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Do you think this might be an indication of design from non-supernatural intelligence?

....i dont think that the reductionist idea of human consciousness being exactly congruent to the physical structure of the brain and its chemical and electrical processes is going to survive this discussion.

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I should think that science has no problem with the idea that consciousness is a bi-product of the brain's bio-electro-chemical activity. Is consciousness another indicator of design by non-supernatural intelligence?

Warren has made some distinction between 'intelligent self-organization' and 'intelligently designed' (engineered).

Do either of these two terms fit into your ideas about 'evolving awareness'?

>>>>Do you think this might be an indication of design from non-supernatural intelligence?

I have problems with the concepts "design" and "intellegence" in this context, because they seem to me to carry connotations of rational planning by some entity (beware! lurking anthropomorphism ahead). If you start off down this road you could easily end up painting yourself into philosohical corner where the only way out is postulating an entity of some kind (and then you end up with inquisitions, suicide bombers, wars over christs foreskin etc

).
I tend to think of an organic "intellegience" whose natural end is inherent in its beginnings, (this is not a good example dont take it in any way literally but only as a pointer) in the way that an oak is inherent in an acorn. A becoming rather than a product of accretive or planned design.

>>>>>I should think that science has no problem with the idea that consciousness is a bi-product of the brain's bio-electro-chemical activity. Is consciousness another indicator of design by non-supernatural intelligence?

The idea that the brain is some kind of biochemical computer with conciousness as its by product doesnt take into account actual experience, the actual raw data of conciousness. How do we experience the world? Do we see it as bits of sensory data rushing around through a biological computer?
The world comes to us as direct experience not as bits of objectivist data, but as hopes, fears, attractions, aversions etc that arise by themselves, they are there whenever we look. The very idea of the brain as a biological computer is a concious concept. Conciousness attempting to explain itself away?

Intellegient self organization would be closest, misses the mark somehow though, doesnt include the kind of organic wholism I percieve and smells of anthropomorphism.

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I agree, for the most part--I can also entertain the notion that it can arise from inherently imprecise ID semantics.

(Note: At this point in the discussion, I should like to draw attention to Warren's conspicuous absence from the thread. I am not a proponent of Intelligent Design--either flavor--and I cannot make his case for non-supernatural ID for him.)

Warren:

In your own words, "I personally see more than sufficient evidence to trigger a suspicion...."

Shall no one, can no one, speak in reasoned defense of Intelligent Design?

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Im still thinking about the attribution of judgement, as in a selection of one alternative or possibility over another, to something that by definition must contain all possibilities and at the same time is organically elolving (could I decide to grow another finger to improve my typing?).

Im also still thinking about wether its possible to discover an interior truth from an exterior starting point or vice versa (could you deduce electricity from a starting point of jungian psychology?) Is it possible to prove conciousness from an empirical starting point? Yet conciousness exists, we experience it.

Theoretically, Intelligent Design has a very high probability factor of being the chosen ecological framework for complex planetary surface systems.

Neither religionism nor evolution has a satisfactory framework outside of their narrow descriptions.

Religionism can most quickly be set aside as not being further included in this hypothesis because it is dependant on an outside agent and so could only be regarded as a subset of Intelligent Design.

Evolution can almost as quickly be set aside unless it is realized that evolution will only ever produce a narrow specrtrum of diversity of life on any given planet, and since I get the impression that you are looking for a theory that would account for a diverse ecological system, such as the one on this planet, we will proceed to set it aside. When the basic molecules for the ingrediants of life are first being attracted to each other it would take eons for them to ferment and finaly begin to be gathered together in sufficient quantity for something complex to form out of the mix. That something might only form at one point on the planet and it would consume whatever it needed to consume to insure that it was able to propagate. The emerging life process would be measured in geologic time and that would insure that the first emerging species would reach population saturation on the planet before a competing species could form to compete for food resources and actually would itself remain undeveloped and part of the food chain.

On some planets it might be possible for two or maybe even up to five different species of life to form, provided the populations are separated by sufficient barriers so as to restrict premature population interaction. Plant life, of course, would form faster and be more diverse but still would be within a narrow spectrum for the same afore mentioned reason of primary species domination.

This discription precludes the possiblity of evolution as it is known in theory on this planet. However, it does allow for, and indeed calls for, natural selection in order that species can continue to pass on their better traits to the succeeding generations.

Intelligent Design begins with collecting specimen of every known kind of life form from every life supporting planet that is known and systematically experimenting with them until every nuance of them is also known, including the compatibility-of-life systems factor.

The only way to find out if a theory of intelligent design can advance our understanding beyond that of a "blind watchmaker" theory is to use the scientific method....

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"Intelligent design is a form of teleology

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When I hear the term 'Intelligent Design', I think 'directed purpose'. Warren says no deity is involved in 'intelligent design' but suggests a 'seeing watchmaker'. Does that mean to imply that nature--the Cosmos--itself is somehow self-aware, that it has a purpose toward which it knows to work by directing its components and their interactions toward that end? That in somehow understanding its ultimate purpose the Cosmos knows what it needs to achieve it and how to accomplish it?

If we humans, for instance, are a directed attempt by the Cosmos to become more aware of itself through our intelligence and perceptions, are we intruments of its self-analysis? Is that our lives' directed purpose?

m0rl0ck ponders:

....wether its possible to discover an interior truth from an exterior starting point or vice versa....

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Perhaps 'intelligent design' implies the Cosmos has the same difficulty--the inability to learn about, and comphrehend, its own origin. And perhaps, as its constructed instruments, neither can or will we. Thus, forever we are left to speculate both wishfully and wistfully. Is that a natural consequence of 'intelligent design'?

To suggest that perhaps the cosmos could make an attempt, through the formation of humans, to become more aware of itself is to delve into the realm of supernatural intelligent design and thus embrace theologic concepts while rejecting physics. If that is the case then perhaps you should move this thread over to the religionists section and hook up to an Ohm! meter and seek one with the universe that way.

Perhaps I have not fully understood your position, but from earlier postings I got the impression that you equate creation and religionism and reject both as lacking empirical evidence.

In my enjoining this discussion I made mention of the theory of primary species domination as being the logical culmination of planetary population. As this theory of primary species domination, which is natural selection, which heretofore was superceded by the wider theory of evolution, which in previous postings I read that you support, leaves you without a supported theory, I believe it is incumbent on you to give a clear statement on what exactly is your position and how it relates to your perception of Intelligent Design, pro or con. Or, since the theory of primary species domination now gives you a more focused understanding of the results of natural selection and makes you realize, as I do, that the theory of evolution, as it was heretofore known and understood by it's description as Darwinian Theory, is defunct, we can proceed.

Towards that end I will now make an observation. When a species has no predatory species attacking it's population it will reproduce until the environment it is in is supporting maximum capacity. This unpredatorized domination of an environment by a species has been observed in microcosm on different parts of this planet when animals have been introduced on continents that were foreign to their developement and were without natural predators. An example of note is the infestation of rabbits in Australia. There the rabbits are producing in great number and eating other species out of their food supply to the extent that some species are in danger of extinction.

It is therefore my hypothesis that for a functional ecosystem to be as diverse as the one we are somewhat familiar with on this planet, that some agent, which at this point I will refer to as the intelligent design aspect, must have integrated various primary species.

To suggest that perhaps the cosmos could....become more aware of itself is to delve into the realm of supernatural intelligent design and thus embrace theologic concepts while rejecting physics. If that is the case then perhaps you should move this thread over to the religionists section and hook up to an Ohm! meter and seek one with the universe that way.

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Perhaps I have not fully understood your position,....I got the impression that you equate creation and religionism and reject both as lacking empirical evidence.

No, indeed I am atheist. Because Warren says that "intelligent design is a....framework....for theories and hypotheses...." I am attempting to discover the framework's foundation and component parts. Because Warren also says that "The only way to find out if a theory of intelligent design can advance our understanding....is to use the scientific method....", I am merely forming various temporary hypotheses and offering them for validation or invalidation as part of a process of ambiguities elimination.

As you and others are applying 'intelligent design' in the context of ecological/biological systems, I was curious whether NID's proponents also will apply ID to Nature in its entirety--the Cosmos: the sum-total of the 'observable' univese and the still as yet 'unobservable' universe (the part(s) of the cosmos hidden from us for the time being because too little time has passed for information from those really distant regions to arrive at Earth). So, yes. I am (provisionally) courting such metaphysical concepts to learn how specifically NID is distinguished apart from other ID iterations--like creationism--as a Cosmos: possibly aware but not conscious (non-supernatural), and as opposed to the naturalist's no-awareness-at-all (natural) cosmos.

I believe it is incumbent on you to give a clear statement on what exactly is your position and how it relates to your perception of Intelligent Design, pro or con.

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'Intelligent design' connotes 'directed purpose'--a concept that is beyond the scope and capabilities of empirical endeavors to quantify and validate. As an investigative presupposition, 'intelligent design' introduces additional complexity unnecessary to the considerable abilities of less complex, empirically supportable and defensible explanations of natural processes. That is not to say that 'intelligent design' has no merit as a teleology, but that Science has no immediate need to resort to 'intelligent design' in any of its forms.

....evolution will only ever produce a narrow specrtrum of diversity of life on any given planet,....When the basic molecules for the ingrediants of life are first being attracted to each other it would take eons for them to ferment and finaly begin to be gathered together in sufficient quantity for something complex to form out of the mix. That something might only form at one point on the planet and it would consume whatever it needed to consume to insure that it was able to propagate.

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That premise might be true on a planet with one larger lake in whose limited volume the chemistry of life might be initiated and thus confined to a single geographic location. But on early Earth, at least, vast oceans provided potentially zillions of different locations for biochemical activity to begin and, therefore, what is to say that it did not do so in many different places at the same time? Thus leading to great diversity as has been seen in the fossil records of evolutionary history.

I made mention of the theory of primary species domination as being the logical culmination of planetary population.

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Episodically, perhaps. But what of the occasional impacting asteroid or comet that kills the principals and allows the secondaries and the tertiaries, etc. to fill their now-abandoned niche?

When a species has no predatory species attacking it's population it will reproduce until the environment it is in is supporting maximum capacity. .... It is therefore my hypothesis that for a functional ecosystem to be as diverse as the one we are somewhat familiar with on this planet, that some agent, which at this point I will refer to as the intelligent design aspect, must have integrated various primary species.

I made mention of the theory of primary species domination as being the logical culmination of planetary population.

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Even during the 145 Million years-long history of the Dinosaurs, the land & seas still were filled with a tremendous diversity of animal, reptile, amphibian, fish, crustacean, insect & plant, etc., species. Australia's rabbits may be decreasing the diversity of mammals and marsupials, etc. in a particular habitat, but as an unmitigated hazard to planetary diversity, only humanity would fit your example to close approximation I should think.

The 145 million year reign of dinosaur life can only be regarded as a subset of the ecological life system on this planet the same as the life system that we currently exist in can only be regarded as a subset of the ecological life system on this planet. We humans live in all the same areas as did the dinosaur life system and so there would have to be bones and fossils of our ancestral natural selection stage among the bones and fossils of those dinosaurs, that we find in such profusion, for there to be a viable assumption that we developed on this planet as a primary species coincidental with other primary species.

But we find there is no such record and there is actually a disconnection of tens of million of year between the evidentiary proof that allows archaeology to state that both systems did indeed at one time reside on this planet. Since all archaeology is in agreement that there was not enough time since dinosaur extinction and the first appearance of human life on this planet for human life to have evolved here by the method of natural selection, then it must be hypothesized that human life first appeared on this planet as a fully developed primary species. If that hypothesis is allowed then provision must also be made for the hypothesis that the dinosaur system could also have appeared on this planet as a fully developed integrated primary species system.

At some point in the distant past there had to have been an instant on this planet when there was no atmosphere and the concurrent instant when there was atmosphere. In that earliest developing stage there would as yet have been no living systems on this planet and there wouldn't be until all criteria of composition and circumstance were met. It is at this point that the odds on all the required actions intersecting to produce life would be astronomically large and unlikely to be creating different species simultaneously in a multitude of places around the planet, which would be required for there to be a plethora of primary species.

In this earliest of stages the planet would not be covered with liquid oceans as it is now and as it was when the dinosaurs reigned but would have more of an appearence like the moon Europa. I'm not sure how you meant that comet and asteroid impacts could disperse species since to my way of thinking any diplaced life form would not survive atmospheric reentry. Nor do I believe that life could travel on an asteroid let alone survive a planetary impact. As for plate tectonics, volcanism and tidal actions, they would all be secondary to life force initialization.

I have to say that before I read your thread starter on Intelligent Design I didn't know what was meant by it and from the description you quoted I'm still not quite sure although I get the idea that it is meant in the metaphysical sense. If that is it then I would have to regard the use of Intelligent Design in that case as an oxymoron since it precludes physics as the basis of intelligence and instead equates it with an idea which is only a construct of intelligence. It is also my belief that there are no constructs in the universe that cannot be described empiracally when sufficient observation has been collated.

Since all archaeology is in agreement that there was not enough time since dinosaur extinction and the first appearance of human life on this planet....

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Well, certainly dinosaurs and humans were never contempories, but all archeology has not agreed that there was too little time between their respective ages for evolution to operate. Quite the contrary.

....for human life to have evolved here by the method of natural selection, then it must be hypothesized that human life first appeared on this planet as a fully developed primary species.

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Your hypothesis is that 'intelligent designed' primary species--the indomitable species--appear from nowhere in fully developed forms. Further, that it is impossible for such indomitable species to arise via natural selection, and the other evolutionary mechanisms operating in parallel to it, over such brief periods of geologic time. And that the Theory of Evolution--unlike 'intelligent design', amply supported by a formidable body of evidences, is in error, unprovable and otherwise disproven. So 'intelligent design' must be the correct and the only possible alternative explanation to natural selection.

Once again, Warren has stated previously:

The only way to find out if a theory of intelligent design can advance our understanding beyond that of a "blind watchmaker" theory is to use the scientific method....

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As such, what predictions can 'intelligent design' make that can be tested to begin the accumulation of proofs necessary to establish its validity as a better alternative to TOE?

If that hypothesis is allowed....

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Well, that remains to be seen.

....there had to have been an instant on this planet when there was no atmosphere and the concurrent instant when there was atmosphere.

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Planetary accretion mechanisms produce volatiles for atmospheres from the earliest times in a planet's existence--gaseous by-products of ice-laiden comets and asteroids and their cratering impacts, as well as vulcanism and geothermal out-gassings due to gravitational compression and chemical differentiations.

....the odds on all the required actions intersecting to produce life would be astronomically large and unlikely to be creating different species simultaneously in a multitude of places around the planet,

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Presumably, I am just as free to speculate the 'odds' were just as likely there were an 'astronomically large' multitude of 'other places around the planet' where different species were arising simultaneously. To which specific species do you refer, viruses or cellular-based?

In this earliest of stages the planet would not be covered with liquid oceans as it is now....

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What is the time frame defining "earliest of stages"?

I'm not sure how you meant that comet and asteroid impacts could disperse species....

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No, that indomitable species are just as perishable by comet and asteroid impactors as the species they 'dominate'.

Nor do I believe that life could travel on an asteroid let alone survive a planetary impact.

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Aimino acids have been found inside the Muchison meteorite, as well as ALH-77306, Yamato 74662 and Yamato 791198 meteorites, and others:

A great many organic molecules are found throughout space within intersteller gas clouds--gas clouds from which form comets, asteroids and planets. Planets form from materials containing organic molecules which, when dissolved in water, afford abundant material useful to biotic chemistry.

....before I read your thread starter on Intelligent Design I didn't know what was meant by it...

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I, too, am still trying to find out. Warren?

I get the idea that it is meant in the metaphysical sense.

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I suspect that is so, though I have been trying to limit such connotation while I query ID proponents for reasons why it isn't so, even though it seems to be.

....Intelligent Design....precludes physics as the basis of intelligence and instead equates it with an idea which is only a construct of intelligence.

I found your last two posts very amusing at my expense and all over the misuse of a single word. Where I used the word "appear" what I meant was "arrive". I was very tired when I wrote that post and I noticed I also misspelled a word. I went back and corrected the misspelled word, which I generally do when I find them, but of course it would not be proper to go back and change a whole word.

For clarification, I will state for the record that I, too, do not believe in creationism. I believe that all matter, and all systems constructed of matter, can be described empirically.

You say that not all archaeologists believe that there wasn't enough time between the dinosaurs and us for humankind to evolve. That is contrary to my understanding of a speculated time frame for species development. Perhaps you could direct me to a book or two.

When I intimated that our species arrived here fully formed I was thinking that they were brought here, in the physical sense. If the amino acids that arrived here on meteorites weren't the result of contamintion, then I still don't see how anyone could seriously entertain the idea that they could have developed into us in the time period since dinosaur extinction. But perhaps that's not what you really meant. I got the impression that the word "appear" got you so incensed that I was a creationist after all, that you furiously pounded the keys on your keyboard in your flaming response. But, perhaps I'm being too theatrical.

Everything, whether it be biological life or a star or a planet, had to go through a development stage. That means that there has to be a concurrance where one development stage meets the succeeding development stage. My point was that the atmosphere must develop first in order for there to be an environment conducive to the development of animate life. As for a time frame, we will have to be content with saying "a long time ago" because the time frame that I hear most, which is six billion year or so, is derived from the universe having "big banged" 9, 12 or 15 billion year ago and that is a ludicrous assumption. The "big bang" theory is actually the ultimate creationist theory and so it can be dismissed with impunity.

As for the Johnson quote, I should have prefaced it as a reply to Warren's previously posted comments about 'intelligent design' not necessasrilly being associated with creationism. Actually, nothing of what you have said is the direct motivation for my making that post. Sorry, again, for the confusion. I plead hasty composition in between the necessities of doing real work on occasion here at work.